WVC 18 - 30 - 7
§18-30-7. West Virginia savings plan trust.
(a) The board may establish a savings plan trust, and may
establish a savings plan trust fund account, titled the "Savings
Plan Trust Fund," within the accounts held by the treasurer or with
a financial institution, an investment manager, a fund manager, the
West Virginia investment management board or any other person for
the purpose of managing and investing the trust fund. Assets of
the savings plan trust are held in trust for account owners and
beneficiaries.

(b) The savings plan trust fund shall receive all moneys from
account owners on behalf of beneficiaries of savings plan contracts
or from any other source, public or private. Earnings derived from
the investment of the moneys in the college savings trust fund
shall remain in the fund, held in trust in the same manner as
contributions, except as refunded, applied for purposes of the
beneficiaries, and applied for purposes of maintaining and
administering the savings plan.

(c) The corpus, assets and earnings of the savings plan trust
fund do not constitute public funds of the state and are available
solely for carrying out the purposes of this article. Any contract
entered into by or any obligation of the board on behalf of and for
the benefit of the savings plan does not constitute a debt or
obligation of the state, but is solely an obligation of the savings
plan trust fund. The state has no obligation to any designated
beneficiary or any other person as a result of the savings plan. All amounts payable from the savings plan trust fund are limited to
amounts available in the fund.

(d) Nothing in this article or in any savings plan contract is
a promise or guarantee that the distributions available for a
beneficiary will cover the cost of qualified higher education
expenses at an eligible educational institution, or as a promise or
guarantee of admission to, continued enrollment in, or graduation
from an eligible higher education institution.

(e) The requirements of the provisions of chapter thirty-two
of this code do not apply to the sale of a savings plan contract by
the board, its employees and agents.

(f) The savings plan and any savings plan trust fund shall
continue in existence until terminated by the Legislature as it
determines or by the board upon determining that continued
operation is infeasible. Upon termination of the plan, the
balances of savings plan accounts, less any distributions, refunds,
fees, charges and penalties, are sent to account owners, to the
extent possible, and any unclaimed assets in the program shall
revert to the state in accordance with the uniform unclaimed
property act in article eight, chapter thirty-six of this code.

(g) The state pledges to account owners and beneficiaries of
the savings plans that the state will not limit or alter the rights
under this article which are vested until the obligations are met
and discharged. However, nothing in this subsection prohibits the
Legislature from discontinuing or terminating a savings plan.

(h) In order to fulfill the charitable and public purposes of
this article, neither the earnings nor the corpus of the savings
plan trust fund is subject to taxation by the state or any of its
political subdivisions.

(i) Notwithstanding any provision of this code to the
contrary, money in the savings plan trust fund is exempt from
creditor process and not subject to attachment, garnishment, or
other process; is not available as security or collateral for any
loan, or otherwise subject to alienation, sale, transfer,
assignment, pledge, encumbrance or charge; and is not subject to
seizure, taking, appropriation or application by any legal or
equitable process or operation of law to pay any debt or liability
of any account owner, beneficiary or successor in interest.

Note: WV Code updated with legislation passed through the 2016 Regular Session
The West Virginia Code Online is an unofficial copy of the annotated WV Code, provided as a convenience. It has NOT been edited for publication, and is not in any way official or authoritative.